


A Flower Worth Tending

by DigitalSpectre



Series: By Any Other Name [3]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Other, gender neutral reader
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-02
Updated: 2017-11-02
Packaged: 2019-01-28 09:58:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12604040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DigitalSpectre/pseuds/DigitalSpectre
Summary: Jesse McCree had done a lot of bad things in his life.  He was trying to do the right thing, turn his life around. He found someone he loved in a fellow Blackwatch agent, an amnesiac who couldn't remember their past. But then they died, and he felt like he was still being punished. Even when you turned out to be alive, you were still lost to him. In love with someone else.But maybe. Maybe you aren't lost to him after all.McCree's perspective of Flowers by your Doorstep and part of Snake in the Grass.





	A Flower Worth Tending

When Jesse McCree first saw you, he thought he was hallucinating.

There was no way that anyone could really be that attractive. You were standing next to Reyes, following him through the base looking like a lost puppy that someone had spent a long time kicking. And then you looked McCree's way with these large frightened eyes. As far as he was concerned he never had a chance. You were very real.

He followed you for a bit, watching you take in the base. You seemed so uncertain, so confused, so in need of help. The urge to protect you and take you under his wing was strong. But not as strong as Reyes’ wing, which was already sweeping you into his office and shooting McCree a warning glare. Leave this one alone, kid. McCree just waved and walked away. Like hell would he drop this. He had to know who you were.

But you didn’t even know who you were. Turns out no one did. There was no one looking for you, no reports made. You were a mystery. 

Every time McCree tried to get close to you Reyes was there, hovering like a giant protective bear. But that just made McCree more determined to see you. He watched you at the practice range mostly. You ran each drill like your life depended on it. Pushed yourself harder and harder until you pushed yourself into the medbay. He found you there a few times, helping the doctors tend to the wounded. Tend to him. Your touches were always so soft. So gentle. You looked like you were going to cry every time you saw someone hurt. He wanted to comfort you so badly.

That’s when he got the best idea he’d ever had in his life.

You didn’t have a name, but what if he helped you find one? Flowers were names, and flowers were romantic, and he had enough free time to get a ton of flowers. But what would suit you? Something sweet. Something small. Something, caring? Were plants caring? Of course they were. McCree sucked up his pride and asked the tiny old woman working there. She immediately handed him a tiny lavender plant and wished him the best of luck.

He waited, lingering in the hall until he saw you sluggishly walk to your room. The way your face lit up when you saw the plant, the smile that glimmered in your eyes when you picked up the card. You looked so, excited. 

He had to keep going. He wanted you to smile more. Smile for him. It became increasingly hard not to talk about how cute you were. How he wouldn’t mind going to the medbay more often if you were waiting for him there. Reyes didn’t seem to appreciate it and Genji frankly didn’t seem to care. But Genji was a better friend than McCree had given him credit for. As soon as he began training you to fight, Genji began to bring you around. At first it was just on occasion, for movies or a tv show. Then it was for meals. And then you came on your own. You were friends, and you were wonderful. Kind, sweet, friendly. A little silly. But all you seemed to want was to smile and make others smile.

There wasn’t a flower out there that was good enough for you. 

McCree didn’t want to believe that Reyes actually meant you for the field. You were too soft. You weren’t cut out for blackwatch business. That sort of stuff was on the shadowy side. Where laws and morals went soft. Where the only thing that mattered was stopping the bad guys. He couldn’t get the idea of you, cornered, surrounded by people that wanted to kill you out of his mind. McCree pushed you, and pushed you, and pushed you. You would never miss. Your shots would kill, not injure. He would protect you by arming you. By teaching you every trick in his book. By pushing.

Every time you excelled he got a little more scared. Reyes was going to put you in the field. It was an unspoken weight that settled on McCree’s shoulders.

He cherished you, and didn’t even think that you might feel the same until he almost died. He closed his eyes expecting to see heaven. When he opened his eyes, there heaven was. Eyes puffy with tears. Sitting by his side with fear dominating every inch of your expression. You laid your head on him and just stared at him with so much worry. So much care. McCree already knew he loved you. But he began to wonder if you loved him too.

You disappeared after he woke up. Reyes sent you on a mission. The loss of his arm hurt. The fear that you might be next made it worse. He feared for you. The only sleep he got came because the doctor kept drugging him.

You came back, late at night. Sat by his bedside and held his hand. Whispered that you’d killed a man. And he opened his eyes and told you, good. Reyes sent you after a bad guy. There was now one less bad guy in the world, because of you. And if it was you, or a bad guy, then they could all die. McCree was high off his ass, but he felt so clear. He clutched your hand in his and went back to sleep. When he woke up to you gone, he knew you’d come back. 

As soon as the doctor let him out, McCree didn’t waste any time. Life was short. There was risk in both of your lives. You could lose each other. He had to trade favors all across the elite of Overwatch. But they all helped him in the end. It took, way too much of his paycheck and hours of work, but McCree had found the right name for you. No flower was good enough. So he would arm you one last time. He would give you a name that threatened to bite.

Thorn.

You kissed him in a room full of roses and his life was complete. He had been yours since the first day you set first on base, but now you were his too. He kissed and touched and savored every single moment. He wanted you to remember him if something happened. Because McCree would never allow you to die before he did. He didn’t care what he’d have to do to make it happen. 

Reyes made it easy. You weren’t sent on high stakes missions. You were sent to kill people, but quietly, alone. Small targets that caused cascades. More often than not you were just gathering evidence for him to pass over to Morrison. It kept you safe. Kept McCree happy. Kept you together. Even when things began to turn sour, you kept optimistic. Assured McCree that everything was going to turn out alright. He knew you were wrong but couldn’t bear to let you down. He would fight for you.

He should have fought harder.

When Reyes sent him away he assumed it was because of the growing schism. Of the things that Reyes knew but wasn’t saying. He assumed that, eventually, you would be joining him. Assumed that Reyes would send you there. He was wrong. You were at base, fighting to keep Blackwatch together. And the bomb went off.

Jesse McCree’s entire world fell apart with a single, all-encompassing blast.

You were gone.

He didn’t move for days. Only got up and showered because he needed to eat. Needed to drink. A lot. Until he couldn’t move again. Weeks came and went. Months changed. Seasons passed. He stood low and underground. Mourning. He wasn’t even sure how he came out of it. The pain was still there but he was moving, working. Took jobs as a gun for hire. Life went on.

Years passed and you were a distant ache in his memory. One that only flared when someone nice came to his side and tried to wrangle themselves a cowboy. But it took one touch and he would remember you. Your smile. Your eyes. He couldn’t do it. And that made it all the worse. He wanted so badly to move on. You were dead. You had been dead for five years. No one even found your body. Your grave was a cheap memorial to ‘all of the fallen’ that no one visited. Your name wasn’t even there.

McCree didn’t know what to think of Winston’s call. He ignored it, threw it to the side, until Genji came for him a year later. Explained that it was working, that they were doing good things. Asked him to come, just to see how it went. McCree thought of you and said yes.

On the plane ride, Genji broke the news. You were alive.

All at once, the light came back. Sound was clearer. Color burst into McCree’s vision so sharply he had to rub his eyes to adjust. You were alive. You hadn’t died in the explosion after all. You weren’t completely whole, Genji wouldn’t explain what had happened and asked McCree to be gentle about asking. But you were alive. Alive.

When McCree stepped onto base, a small watchpoint that was slowly being repaired, Genji gave him another warning. You weren’t, alone. You had moved on. Found someone else. His brother. Hanzo. Somehow the motherfucker who’d torn his own brother apart won your heart.

McCree didn’t believe it. 

He opened the doors to the rec room and there you were. Alive. Alive. Alive. You were sitting on a man’s lap with your arms around his shoulders and you were smiling. You looked so, so amazingly happy. Alive. You looked alive. You didn’t even look up when McCree walked in; your eyes were focused on the man’s face. He was handsome, McCree had to give him that. And he looked every bit as happy as you did.

It wasn’t until old Reinhardt said hello that you looked up. Stunned. Your face covered in, piercings? You immediately masked your shock with a friendly smile and a wave, like nothing was, wrong. 

Your hand. No. Your eyes.

Genji had said that something had happened. But what?

You avoided McCree. Each time felt like a fresh stab wound. He wanted just to hear your voice. To see you alive. To see you okay. You even jumped into a vent once. He saw you clearly. He’s pretty sure you knew he saw you. But you went in there anyway. Didn’t come out again for hours.

You were, different. Freed and restrained at the same time. You were every bit the gentle, kind person you used to be. The silliness was still there. But you also held back. Bound things up. Hid them. Pretended they weren’t there. You were so distant. So far. The only time you seemed to relax is when you were with Hanzo. 

McCree bit back the pain just to be close. Stood next to Hanzo and practiced while you tussled with Genji. Murmuring threats under his gunshots. If Hanzo hurt you, if Hanzo so much as made you frown, McCree would be after him with all the fires of hell. And to McCree’s surprise, Hanzo stared him in the eyes and said, good. If Hanzo hurt you, you wouldn’t do anything about it. Someone had to.

McCree found it very hard to hate Hanzo after that.

It didn’t help that Hanzo was so damn pretty. That you and Hanzo sitting next to each other became a sight that was hard to take. It wasn’t just you, it was you and him. McCree was beginning to wonder just how much he would have to pay for the mistakes of his youth.

Every mission with Hanzo became an excuse to flirt shamelessly. Hanzo blushed much easier than McCree thought he would. Hanzo pointed out, just once, that he was dedicated to you and that the flirting was pointless. McCree brushed it off by reminding Hanzo that they both loved the same person. Hanzo didn’t mention it again.

McCree's mission with you revealed what you seemed so unwilling to tell him. That there was still something you were carrying. Something that made you fear 76's sniper, Shrike. You weren’t talking. Weren’t telling him why. You would have told him before. You told McCree everything before. And you weren’t his anymore. But he still needed you. Still needed your voice. Your company. Your attention. He needed you to let him help. You weren’t ready, but you admitted that you weren’t okay. You promised to tell him and he believed you. It took months but you weren’t lying to him anymore.

You were friends again. And as you and Hanzo began to pester him to play your silly roleplaying game, McCree got the second best idea of his life.

After all. He would be a fool to pass up the chance with a dragon or an elf. Both is the sort of thing that dreams are made of. And Jesse McCree deserved to have his dreams come true again.

**Author's Note:**

> Something in me enjoys making McCree sad a bit too much. I swear he'll be less sad soon.


End file.
